Indefinite Detentions Overturned

by Steve

Last week, military judges knocked the legs out from under John McCain and Lindsey Graham’s Military Commissions Act, finding that the bill Bush pushed through a brain-dead GOP Congress last year was invalid. Today, a federal appeals court ruled by a 2-1 margin that the Military Commissions act does not deny a legal immigrant here at home and alleged “enemy combatant” the right to face his accusers in court, and found that Bush has illegally detained him for over five years without sufficient evidence or due process. The dissenting judge, a visiting jurist from another district, said that Bush has the authority to detain someone indefinitely if they fit the profile of an Al Qaeda “stealth” warrior. Swell, under this judge's world view, there is little difference between us and a banana republic.

Bush, Alberto, and the GOP congress had years to work out a system that met constitutional and international tests, and failed to do so.